assuming you're driving;
- Sainte mere eglise. Cute little town, take a stroll around the church and see a bunch of the ww2 exploiting souvenir shops and cafés all based on the invasion
- Batterie Crisbeq - just up from Utah beach, nice little battery you can walk in to a bunker, it has fantastic view over the slopes and fields leading down to the beach + some flak guns etc. If the battery is closed you can jump the fence and lol around between the flak pits (we did)
- Pointe du motherfuckin Hoc! No buts, just go.
- Merville battery
- Pegasus Bridge, eat a baguette at the Madamde Douvres café, it's classic! lots of seniors there. also it's worth listening to the guide in the museum, as well as of course take a stroll over the bridge itself, it's on land now
- Omaha (not much to see) you need to walk quite far to get to the classic widerstand nests, or drive to the
- Omaha memorial - massive sight, a must see. From here you can get to the Widerstands nests easier than from the actual beach.
- Hillman Bunker (bunker with "live action")
http://www.ww2museums.com/article/462/Hillman-Bunker.htm- Bernieres-Sur-mer, classic town. a bit hard to find without GPS. Has Juno Beach (we missed it because we were on top of the plateau above it, acidentally running in to a battery with 4 intact bunkers + guns)
Make sure you have GPS in the car! The roads in normandy are really stupid and it's super easy to miss the turns and find the roads. I would add your locations to the GPS at the hotel or so, get the adresses from the internet.
Places I didn't visit but wish I did when I was there;
- Port-en-Bessin
- Dead Man's corner
- Carentan
Overall, actual ww2 sites are always cooler than museums in Normandy. You have museums up to your ears, trying to squeeze as much dough out of tourists as possible, and indeed they have large collections of cool stuff, but the memories you bring home will be from actual locations.
Enjoy your trip! Im jealous, we will probably re-visit Normandy next spring and catch all the places we missed the first time.